


What’s the Color of the Sky?

by DoomedKelpie



Series: Trick or Treat (And What Follows) [9]
Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Banter, Blood, Creativity | Roman "Princey" Sanders Angst, Crying, Deceit | Janus Sanders Angst, Janus and Remus are friends, Light Angst, Morality | Patton Sanders Angst, Remus being Remus, Sympathetic Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders, Sympathetic Deceit | Janus Sanders, mild violence, references to mental illness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-16
Updated: 2021-01-16
Packaged: 2021-03-14 13:41:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,122
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28796343
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoomedKelpie/pseuds/DoomedKelpie
Summary: The sky turns green, which is a real problem when Janus is trying to reassure an upset Patton.
Series: Trick or Treat (And What Follows) [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2002450
Comments: 4
Kudos: 77





	What’s the Color of the Sky?

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so, this is part of a series, but you could mostly read it alone. For it to make sense, though, you need to know that it has been established that Janus uses the color of the sky to indicate whether he’s lying or not when things start getting confusing (blue = truth; green = lies). You can probably figure that out from reading this, but I just wanted to make that clear.

Janus wasn’t quite sure what to do about this situation. 

This hadn’t ever actually happened before, but now it had.

_ The sky was fucking green. _

And, okay, that shouldn’t be that big of a deal because it wasn’t like he needed to use his sky-color-code system all the time, except he was currently  _ trying _ to use it. As he silently cursed himself for going to the imagination and looking up on the  _ one _ day the sky decided to be green, Roman was glaring at him. 

“Seriously, what the hell, Lyin’ King?!” Roman questioned. “What bug crawled up your butt today? Patton didn’t even do anything!”

Janus growled in frustration, though he was sure it looked more like he was growling at Roman.

“I was telling the  _ truth! _ ” he insisted. “The sky  _ is _ green!”

Patton was standing behind Roman, his cheeks wet with tears that had only just stopped falling. Janus felt bad about upsetting Patton, especially when the man had already been upset, but that  _ hadn’t _ been his intention.

“You’re literally just telling us that you were lying!”

“I  _ wasn’t _ lying!”

He hated this. All he’d been trying to do was comfort Patton. He’d come downstairs around lunchtime, and he’d found Patton crying at the kitchen table. Then, after a few minutes of rubbing the other side’s back, Patton had broken down and told him that he felt like no one cared about him, even though he knew that wasn’t true. And of  _ course _ , that wasn’t true. And so, in a moment of absolute  _ brilliance _ , Janus told him that the others (and Janus himself) did, in fact, care. Then, before he could realize it was a bad idea, Janus let his little code slip out to reassure the moral side that he was telling the truth- that they really  _ did _ care. 

And so he told Patton the sky was green.

“If you weren’t lying, why would you say the sky is green?! You told us that we would know you’re lying if you did that!” Roman argued.

“Because the sky. Is. GREEN!” Janus argued back. “Go to the damn imagination, and you’ll see that I’m actually telling the truth this time! Why did the sky have to turn green, of all colors, anyway?! I’m not the one who controls the imagination, Roman!”

“Well,  _ I _ didn’t make the sky turn green!”

“Wait, guys,” Patton spoke up with a sniffle. “Is the sky  _ really _ green?”

He was looking at Janus, searching his expression for the truth.

“It is, Patton. We  _ do _ care about you. I wasn’t lying about that, and I’m still not.”

Patton looked a little unsure, but he let a small smile spread across his face anyway.

“I believe you, Janus,” he said. “I’m sorry for crying like this.”

“You… don’t have to apologize, Patton.”

“But maybe we should go check out the imagination, anyway,” Patton suggested. “If the sky’s green, and it isn’t supposed to be, maybe something is wrong.”

Janus shifted his gaze from Patton to Roman, who now appeared to be thinking in uncharacteristic silence. The prince sighed.

“No, I’ll go check it out by myself,” Roman told them. “I just realized that Remus probably has something to do with this. He better not be messing with my side of the imagination again.”

And now Roman looked angry again, though at a different person.

“Hold on for a moment there, Princey,” Janus interjected. “I think I’d rather come along.”

“Why?”

“Knowing you two idiots, there’s a good chance that the two of you will half-maim each other if you’re left alone together,” explained Deceit.

“Well, a little maiming might be good for him…,” he heard Roman grumble under his breath.

Janus raised an eyebrow.

“Are you  _ trying _ to make me comment on the similarities between you and your brother?”

“No!” Roman denied, shooting another glare at him. 

“Well, let’s get going, then. If there’s a problem, we should get on with figuring it out, hm?” said Janus.

“I…,” spoke Patton, shifting uncomfortably. “I think I’ll sit this one out, actually.”

Ah. Right. Remus still made Patton uncomfortable. Janus patted the fatherly side on the head.

“Alright. Why don’t you see what Virgil’s up to? Maybe he wants to bake something,” Janus suggested.

“I… Yeah, I think I’ll do that. See you two in a bit?”

He nodded, and Patton left the kitchen. Janus offered a hand to Roman.

“Shall we?”

XXX

It didn’t take long for the two of them to go down the hall to Roman’s room and enter the door leading to the imagination. And sure enough, the sky was still green.

“Oh,” Roman said, his voice quiet.

“I told you, didn’t I?” Janus huffed in mild irritation. “Did you  _ seriously _ think I would have lied to Patton in that situation?”

Roman rubbed the back of his neck.

“I don’t know,” he responded awkwardly. “It’s hard to tell with you.”

Janus rolled his eyes, pretending that it didn’t sting that Roman was still uncertain about his intentions after all this time. He started walking toward the border with Remus’s side of the imagination. Roman started following him.

“I mean, it’s just that you’re… inconsistent,” Roman told him. “Sometimes you tell the truth, but other times you don’t, and sometimes you’re… well.”

Roman cut himself off, and Janus was glad he did so.

“Glass houses, little prince,” he drawled. “From my point of view, you’re not exactly the most consistent yourself.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Janus stopped and spun around.

“It means that, sometimes you act like we’re fine, and others, you act like you still see me as the villain!” he hissed. 

Roman’s eyes darted to the side, avoiding his gaze.

“Well, I wouldn’t do that if you didn’t still act all- villainous, sometimes!” Roman retorted.

Janus glared at him. 

“Really? When was the last time I acted like a villain?”

“You put one of Remus’s creatures in my bedroom!”

“Oh, please. That thing was harmless. All it did was give you a little fright,” Janus denied. “And you know very well  _ why _ I did that.”

The prince crossed his arms.

“I wasn’t trying to reveal your secrets, Jekyll and Lied,” Roman told him. “I just thought that Thomas should know, and he asked me. I didn’t think you’d get your pants in a twist about it.”

“Oh, yes, I would  _ clearly _ have no issue with you sharing a secret I’ve kept for years and which was only revealed by accident,” Janus replied sarcastically. 

“But we all already knew! And it’s  _ Thomas! _ ”

“I don’t  _ care _ who already knew, Roman! You didn’t have any right to tell anyone!” Janus yelled. “If you were in my position, would you want someone telling people about your mental illness without your consent?”

“I… no,” Roman responded meekly.

“Then you get my point. I know that I’ve done wrong, and I know I’ve wronged  _ you _ and that it wasn’t all justified, but if you’re not going to forgive me for it, then sssstop jerking me around! It would be a lot eassier if you jussst made up  _ your _ mind!” Janus hissed lowly. “I get that you don’t trussst me, Princey, but have you ever thought that I might find it a little  _ hard _ to trussst  _ you?” _

Roman didn’t respond, and with a shake of his head, Janus turned back around and continued their journey to the darker half of the imagination. The rest of the walk was quiet.

It was strange to stand next to the border between the two halves of the imagination. There wasn’t any gradient that slowly shifted between the sides. Instead, it was a sharp contrast, as if there was an invisible wall that kept the two sides entirely separate. Janus supposed that was a testament to just how much Roman hated being associated with his brother.

Where they stood, the grass was green and bright and had little wildflowers interspersed within it, but on Remus’s side, the grass was dark, almost black, and he could tell even before stepping on it that it was bone dry. The trees were different too, being dead and decaying rather than colorful and full of life. Overall, Remus’s side was also far more busy than Roman’s. The forests were filled with underbrush and the creatures within it, and there was far less consistency in what you would find there. 

“Right. Here we are, then,” Janus announced, as if Roman couldn’t tell.

Then, he took the last step into the dark imagination.

“Are you coming, Roman?” he asked the princely side after he had taken a few more steps and Roman had still not taken his first. “You aren’t  _ scared _ , are you?”

Roman gave him an incredulous look.

“What?! Of course not!”

And then Roman took forced, seemingly-confident steps into Remus’s side, walking past Janus as if he was going to lead the way. Janus didn’t need him to do that, of course. He knew where just about everything was here, and he likely had a better idea of where to find Remus than his brother did. 

“He isn’t going to be at the castle at this time of day, Roman.”

Roman stopped in his tracks.

“Remus spends most of the day creating and fighting monsters. He’s probably in the meadow,” Janus explained. 

“... Remus has a meadow?”

“I use the word ‘meadow’ for lack of a better term.”

“... Great.”

XXX

Once they arrived at the ‘meadow’, a large field filled with sharp, needle-like grasses and small plants growing eyeballs instead of flowers, they could hear Remus clearly. As expected, he was fighting something. They weren’t quite sure what that ‘something’ was, though, so a ‘something’ it would remain. 

“Remus!” Janus called out.

But the Duke didn’t hear him, either because he was too absorbed in his fight or because that fight was too loud. Thus, they ventured closer.

“Remus!”

And then Remus landed a mighty blow on the ‘something’, causing blood to splatter around him, spraying the two of them in the process. Roman sputtered indignantly at being covered in mystery blood, but Janus only sighed.

“Remus, now I’m going to have to wash this.”

Remus spun around. 

“Whoopsies! Sorry, didn’t see you there, Dee!” he apologized with a wide grin. “So, why’d you bring little-goody-two-shits here? You want me to feed him to a hippogatorpus?”

“A  _ what- _ ”

“No, Remus, not today.”

“Ah, rats.”

“Did you change the color of the sky?”

“I don’t know. Maaaaaaaaybe. Why, did your code not work?”

“As a matter of fact,  _ yes _ , Remus,” answered Deceit. “And it was rather bad timing.”

“Oh. Was it funny, at least?”

“It definitely wasn’t!” Roman denied. “It made Patton cry!”

“Haha, lol.”

“Remus, would you mind fixing the sky?” Janus requested, pinching the bridge of his nose.

“Do I haaaaaaave to?” Remus whined. “I didn’t even get to see any hijinks from it!”

“Yes, Remus. You do.”

“Oh, fiiiiiine,” he agreed begrudgingly. “Why do you always have to be so  _ boring _ , Dee?”

“ _ Boring? _ I’ll have you know that I am  _ incredibly _ interesting.”

“Well, maybe ‘cuz you’re covered in blood-”

“I’m interesting whether I’m covered in your latest creation or not, you narcissist.”

“I bet you’d be even more interesting in bed~ wink.”

“You know that if you want me to read you a story later, you have to ask nicely, Remus,” Janus reminded him.

“ _ What? _ I  _ was _ being nice!”

Janus raised an eyebrow.

“Okay,  _ fine _ . Will you read little old me a bedtime story later, Jannykins?” 

Remus was making puppy dog eyes at Janus.

“Maybe. I’ll think about it.”

“See, you’re boring.”

And then Janus stuck out his tongue at him.

As the two of them continued to talk, Roman was suddenly hit with the realization that Janus and his brother were  _ enjoying _ this conversation. They were laughing and joking. It was  _ banter _ , not  _ arguing _ . And none of it seemed to be truly malicious or hurtful. Janus really  _ was _ friends with Remus.

It wasn’t like he’d never bantered with Janus before, but there had always been an undercurrent of anger and bitterness to it, even after they had apologized to each other. Janus hadn’t ever used the care-free smile he was using now. Less than an hour ago, Janus had been angrily fighting with Roman, and now, here he was, laughing and having a good time with the evil twin. 

It… definitely made Roman feel not-so-glittery.

XXX

A few days later, Janus found a bouquet of yellow roses and purple hyacinths in front of his bedroom door, and he immediately knew who they were from.

“... That dramatic dumbass…,” Janus grumbled to himself as he went to find a vase for the flowers.

But he got the message.

And when Roman received a similar bouquet, he got the message too.

**Author's Note:**

> So, I really like using flower symbolism and stuff, so I thought I’d have Roman give Janus some flowers and then have Janus return the sentiment.
> 
> Just so y’all don’t have to bother googling the meanings if you don’t know them:
> 
> Yellow Rose = friendship
> 
> Purple Hyacinth = “I’m sorry”/“Forgive me”


End file.
